TV Review: Fear the Walking Dead Season One Episode 4 “Not Fade Away”

by Sherry Lipp

WARNING: SPOILERS AHEAD

It’s hard to believe there are only two episodes left to Fear the Walking Dead. The bad news is that it feels like it’s going to end just when things are really heating up. The good news is that The Walking Dead is almost here. With this fourth episode the show is finally getting to the stuff I most wanted to see when they announced they were going the semi-prequel route. We’re so used to the post-apocalyptic world in TWD that this on-the-verge of collapse society seems completely foreign.

It feels like everyone is doing everything so wrong, but that’s because we know what’s to come. They don’t. Most people seem to be waiting for things to go back to normal. They still think they will be returning to their jobs and regular life will resume any day. Most people still haven’t seen the undead and just like Travis (Cliff Curtis) they aren’t willing to think about what’s really going on. They trust that the “people in charge” will fix this problem.

On The Walking Dead we wonder who’s going to die next. Here we’re wondering who’s going to be taken for “medical treatment” next. I have a feeling death and destruction is coming, but this show is more about suspense than horror. Who’s really in charge? Is it anyone? We presume the military is taking orders from somewhere, but maybe they are just waiting for word like everyone else.

So what were the cool and not so cool moment s this week?

The cool:

Nick stealing morphine: As if things weren’t disturbing enough, we get the image of Nick (Frank Dillane), clad in a bathing suit, hiding out under a hospital bed with his ailing neighbor’s morphine drip between his toes. Yikes.

The tattoo: Another disturbing image – Alicia (Alycia Debnam-Carey) tattooing herself to preserve her boyfriend’s drawing on her arm. Desperate times call for desperate measures I suppose.

The letter: Because things are so chaotic there is little room for sentimentality on the show. However, I found Alicia’s visit to her neighbor Susan’s house to be genuinely touching, especially when she finds her own childhood drawing framed and hanging on the wall. She also finds a letter Susan had written to her husband apparently as things were unfolding. So what did Susan see exactly? Did she keep it to herself because she thinks the zombie apocalypse is a justified punishment from God?

The flashing light: I wonder what it is? Who are they signaling? If they just want help they could easily reveal themselves to the guards, so they must want something else.

Nick and Liza are taken: Well, I didn’t see that coming. While I hadn’t given all that much thought to Liza (Elizabeth Rodriguez), Nick was the last person I thought would be forcibly taken away from his family. Granted Liza went by her own choice, but the whole thing still was a surprise.

The not so cool:

Where are the Walking Dead?: I’m in two minds about this. On the one hand, we’ve pretty much seen all the undead we can handle on The Walking Dead. On the other hand this show is called Fear the Walking Dead and so far not many of the survivors even know they need to fear them because they haven’t seen a single one yet.

Most of them are starting to grow on me. The character I have the biggest problem with is Travis. He seems just too unwilling to accept reality. I’m ready for some new characters, but I don’t know if we’re going to get much this season.